Give Up
"So what you gonna do now, boy?" the question hung in the air like a rattlesnake, surgically poised.
The weight pressed in on me, shrouding me in a halo of black that wasn't just darkness; it undulated. Not looking back, I chose.
And fell.
Far.
Fast.
Forever.
They, the emotions, the connections, the memories, they came away like strips of sunburned skin. Starting over, I stared down the barrel of the night and said: erase. With one willful thought, I tore all of the masks from the shelf and flung them against the wall to make room for the next set. Years gone in one choice. I revelled in the savage freedom of it all.
A voice in my head tried to tell me what I had just lost, how repulsively selfish I was. It itemized the life that I had thrown away, and for what? It was silenced mid-thought, uttering a sound like an old dog being shot. My finger still lay clenched around the trigger. Unrepentant, I burned the bridges and continued down the road.
The weight pressed in on me, shrouding me in a halo of black that wasn't just darkness; it undulated. Not looking back, I chose.
And fell.
Far.
Fast.
Forever.
They, the emotions, the connections, the memories, they came away like strips of sunburned skin. Starting over, I stared down the barrel of the night and said: erase. With one willful thought, I tore all of the masks from the shelf and flung them against the wall to make room for the next set. Years gone in one choice. I revelled in the savage freedom of it all.
A voice in my head tried to tell me what I had just lost, how repulsively selfish I was. It itemized the life that I had thrown away, and for what? It was silenced mid-thought, uttering a sound like an old dog being shot. My finger still lay clenched around the trigger. Unrepentant, I burned the bridges and continued down the road.